Homeownership 101

Remember way back in December when I told we bought a house and I would post soon about it?! Fear not!  You haven't missed the house tour, because here it finally is.  Maybe, I'm not sure what pictures I have.  For now, the sweet baby is asleep and the crazy boy is reading to his animals in the pack and play.  I find myself trying to type slowly and softly so I can hear his sweet voice reading aloud.  For all of the times we fight about staying in his room during rest time, today I find myself wanting to rush in and read with him.  Alone time though, is hard to come by, and good for us both.

At any rate, we are now homeowners of a cute little house on a small tree lined street in college park - only 4 blocks from overbrook.  Sweet paradise.  Paradise with lots of lizards, and a nice black racer we call Sam the Snake.  Hold for a moment while I try to find pictures....

This fun event happened as we were unpacking some kids things and discovered Peter's johnny jump up.  What a great toy for Lucy! Until P started pushing like a swing and it quickly became an accident waiting to happen that actually happened.  But this is in the door frame of L's room which looks right into the kitchen - so she hangs there from time to time when I need to be cooking or cleaning - which is a lot.  A lot of cleaning.  We painted the entire house before we moved in (Benjamin Moore for those wondering...a nice Smoke Embers most places and some Nantucket Fog in some bedrooms.  The fog looks exactly like the shade of blue /gray that is all over my moms house.  Unintentional.  I am my mother - I'm so proud.).  And we put in some new carpet - because honestly, no matter who lived here before - you want to be laying on nice new clean carpet.  Its stained already.  I love babies.  Anyway, the next one is L in her new room.  So far it is my favorite, but I think that is because she has never had a room of her own and I finally got to hang all of her Lovely Lucy art and signs, and Bible verses from our special friends, the Aunts, and she loves it.  She goes in to read often and throws herself against those pillows you see in the background.  She also LOVES looking out her window and acts so surprised every time she sees the flag blowing in the wind.

And these are the babes playing in P's new room.  They really are loving the freedom of being able to run around everywhere and find their way to their rooms.  I love it too, I can see or hear them wherever there are from just standing in the kitchen, or living room.  And lets face it, I can hear them wherever they are because they are loud.  And then you see P man having story time in his room with his animals.  

Aunt T was gone for such a long time!!!  This is our backyard....I'll post the after pics in a few weeks - BML and others have put in a lot of work to get this yard kid friendly and fun, stumps ground and sod is coming on Monday!  I can really hardly stand the wait as I love the idea of just playing in the back all afternoon long.  And really, I don't mind them being complete pig pens in a mud pit everyday - but its tough to get the stains our of their clothes and we're operating on a budget here.  But i did find a bunch of terra cotta pots in the back - where the snakes were living.  So I have been "tapping" on www.tapiture.com (the new and totally awesome website from CMD) all sorts of ideas for container gardening.  Next time you check back in I might have made my own rain barrel, compost pile and be growing  strawberries.  Be aware, I am also tapping make your own granola bars, neosporin, laundry detergent, and cleaning supplies.  So far I haven't made it too far since you have to spend money to save money apparently.  Anyway.

And now the boys are cleaning off the porch with their "pow pow" machines and thought it was hilarious that L was stuck in the middle so she got caught in the wind tunnel.  She thought it was awesome.  P loves doing "chores" around the house so he is in charge of vacuuming and sweeping the concrete porch.

More backyard befores....we're really excited about that tree you can barely see but is enormous.  In the coming months we'll have someone come and check it out, trim some limbs and try desperately to care for it a little better then its previous owners....some people have told us it might be dead, others are sure it is alive and well, we're determined to clean it up!  Someday....

We have lots of helpers around here who fight over the best screwdriver.  Here is everyone reconstructing our ikea shelves for the 6th time.  BML and I continue to be impressed at how well our Ikea furniture has held up in every single one of our moves.  I love that place, I'm embarrassed about it.

And lastly, I finally cleaned out our guest room for you!!!  Separate entrance, full bathroom, converted from the garage so if you visit in the summer it will be nice and cool!!!

One day soon we'll have start having some friends over for playdates, happy hours & cookouts.  Not at the moment though or they will end up coming home looking like this.

We love her.

Anxiety

Lately I have been fairly consumed with anxiety about what my life will look like when I finish the MBA courses in April. I've been fortunate enough to do some pretty amazing traveling and my 2013 resolution to "Always Be Adventuring" is off to a roaring start. But I'm still worried every day that my life won't have the impact I desire - that I'll somehow be forgotten. Too much time has been spent comparing myself to others, in their whole lives, accomplishments, daily activities and too little time has been spent given myself room to experiment with new career paths or even recognizing my own accomplishments. My brain was spinning around in my head trying to determine the next best plan. Then a mentor of mine suggested that I actually write things down. Imagine that. So pasted below is that document. It's dynamic, and I'll consult it when the time comes to decide one career path over the other. For now, I'm going to continue adventuring and continue to dare greatly. (and I'll post International Travel Blogs about Argentina and France very soon)

Taylor Dalton - 

For I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. Jeremiah 29:11-12

Core Beliefs/Values:

 I am confident in my own ability to manage my life (and learning to be more confident in God’s plan – always hopeful they are the same).

I value honesty, loyalty, and care about the needs of others.

I am bold, assertive, and thrive in dynamic environments.

I take pride and ownership in all that I do; it’s important to do things properly, accurately.

I value collaboration and enjoy helping people build their talents.

I am a fighter; for me, for my family, for people I think have been oppressed.

I value intellectual curiosity and discovery.

I am strong-willed and independent.

I desire to leave a lasting impression – in people, communities, organizations, etc.

I believe in living a life (whole life: work, play, home) so that people will know that I love Jesus, but will do so in a way that reflects a personal relationship, not one determined by others.  

Gifts:

Persuasion

Decision-making

Trustworthiness

Critical thinking / Problem Solving

Keeping things moving – taking action

Communication

Eye for detail

Independence

Leadership

Passion – communicating the potential

Adaptive

Passion:

Love talking/acting on larger scale issues. Desperate to feel part of something bigger.

Challenging the norm – innovating or creating new processes

Writing, creating, telling stories

Active, dynamic work –tangible results with immediate impact. Implementing ideas

Working with people to bring out their best.

Righting wrongs; overcoming obstacles

Discovering new things – intellectual curiosity

Problem solving

Challenging myself through new projects, or physical activity

Job Criteria 

+	-
Non-routine work	Routine – same process
Autonomy	Micro management
Tangible results	Report writing without action
Generalist	Too specialized/pigeon-holed
Self-directed but collaborative	Lack of follow through
Enacting change	Red tape bureaucracy
Sense of belonging	Every person for his/herself
Central Florida	Outside USA
High energy & fun	Inactive all desk work
Growth potential
Focused direction
Some travel
Small/medium size
National/global implications of work, still committed to local community.

hey there. its me.

Readers.  Dear readers.  How I have neglected you so.  Please.  Please accept my apologies for keeping you in the dark for so long. Please.

I had to go back and see where I had left you, and as it turns out, even though it was a long time ago, it was probably the perfect place.  My new adventure.  It's already been a crazy run.  Tapiture (my job/adventure) is in the process of blowing up, and I have a front row seat for it.  We recently raised a seed round of just under one million dollars and have been written up in countless (I mean, you can count them, but I don't feel like going back through and actually doing that) publications.  Since I was hired in November as an intern+, I have slid firmly into my role as the Community Manager.  A role that covers all the customer service/support emails, social media, and editing/content curation.  I'll soon be leading an associate editor and team of interns in the curation of the site as we continue to grow.  We have hired a mobile app developer, an intern, a buyer, and as of today the associate editor and another back-end developer.  Our band of merry men is growing exponentially (and gender-ly).  Tomorrow, I interview two more interns to round out our team, for now.  I have no doubt we will be as large as 15 by the end of the year.  That will be triple the size we were when I was hired.  Next quarter, we are launching an e-commerce platform on the site.  This is particularly cool because no site is really doing what we are doing with the social sharing of content coupled with the ability to buy clothes/accessories/gear/gadgets straight from the site.  We already have a small group of merchants ready to list on the site when we launch, and our buyer will be hitting the ground drumming up more companies for us to work with.  We will also be releasing an app soon that is sure to send a spike of users our way.  As we continue to grow, and there is more and more to do, and in turn,  I am seeing my responsibilities grow.  I work pretty much all the time, but when you are part of something so exciting, it doesn't (always) seem like work.  Although, I will say, sometimes it gets old not turning off your computer until midnight (assuming I finish this post in the next half hour, which I'm going to do regardless of if I'm finished, so deal with it).  Any time I need to have a break from the computer screen I can always just look to my left and watch the ocean for a minute.  I can't remember if I told you last time that our office is ON the beach.  There is some other stuff upcoming that is exciting but I can't really talk about yet, so stay tuned.  Also, you can create a google alert for "Tapiture" and read about us when we are in the news.  It happens relatively often.

In other, non-related news, I went up to San Francisco to visit some friends slash help them with a project.  They are launching an app called "Traffic" and wanted some help creating an online marketing video.  I was happy to help.  The app is sort of like a Yelp, but instead of getting reviews from a stranger, you follow your friends(and/or people they know) for reviews.  Places are given a red, yellow, or green light and there is a fixed number of characters to describe why/why not to go there and what/what not to get etc.  It is a very cool idea, and I believe it will do well.  Shooting the videos was a lot of fun, and I think they turned out well.  Here are two of them:

Trevor (Part One)

Trevor (Part Two)

There will be a part 3, but I'm not sure when that will be.